ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews in depth the case of a central website for a large metropolitan public library in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, Hennepin County Library, which serves nearly 1 million residents. The website is a first point of contact for county residents, and it allows patrons to search and reserve library materials, find information about events and programs, and interact with librarians about any questions they may have. The case addresses an eight-month period in which a new version of the website was launched (October 2014 to May 2015). During this period, several patrons offered comments, complaints, suggestions, and compliments about the new website through online forms, emails to librarians, and Facebook and Twitter posts. The case study also includes interviews with library staff members about the web launch, their reactions to patron suggestions, and descriptions of a team approach built to respond to feedback from library audiences. Ultimately, social media responses in this case illustrated a coherent story of change management and resistance to change. Social media responses revealed multiple ways patrons had trouble searching the new website. Comments repeatedly compared and contrasted the “new” and “old” website, often critiquing the new site as well as reasons why the change was made. Responses also included a wealth of questions about how to perform specific tasks on the website, yielding a treasure trove of contextualized user stories. Analysis showed as well that librarians responded to individuals regarding specific questions in public ways through both Facebook and Twitter. These responses contributed to a sense of rapid response by the organization and robust help services. Though social media responses indicated resistance toward the new website, responses also illustrated a very strong sense of audience involvement and a sense of collaboration between the organization and library patrons.
